Copywriters As Migrant Workers

I always know it’s autumn because the most sensitive of the copywriters begin to whine louder than usual. Caught in the pressure cooker of working on year-end appeals and acquisition packages for the New Year, there’s only so much client and agency idiocy a copywriter can take.

Fortunately, I won my copywriter manumission some years ago — long before the horrors of today’s practices — a day when most fundraisers could read, but hardly any made the foolish claim they could write.

No more. Today’s copywriters — especially the most talented — are doomed to suffer the ignominy of being just a cog in an impersonal, hamster cage of production and project schedules, driven by the undiscerning and largely unknowing.

“We need the package Thursday; make it fit the budget.”

So much for creativity and collaboration.

Sadly, copywriters have become little more than migrant workers hired in to harvest the year-end crop or plant the seedlings in the winter’s acquisition field.

I know for certain the autumnal meltdown is once again underway when I receive yet another annual rant from master copywriter and fundraising strategist Bob Levy. Slowly, but surely, year upon year, Bob’s rants chronicle the melting of the creative ice cap.

In this case it’s not the polar bears, but the nonprofits that fail to hear the warnings of ‘creative climate change’ that will endanger fundraising.

Bob’s first rant arrived at The Agitator 5 years ago this month. Words Count warned of the trend toward blindly focusing on the ‘magic’ of file segmentation, while mainly ignoring solid creative and messaging.

Since then, Bob has…

… in The Package Crush, railed against the beauty contests in much of our awards-driven industry, with the admonition that they almost always mask the ugly ducklings that ultimately turn into lovely swans.

… Blown the whistle on the faulty messaging in his More Than The Missionary Position, reminding us that even as we agonize over the next topic needed for the next fundraising appeal to meet that schedule, to meet the budget, to sustain an organization’s annual nut, “we might spend just a little time defining the core messages that drive home just what that organization stands for”.

So, in light of our current focus on retention and some of the factors that make for lousy donor loyalty, the arrival of Bob’s latest rant in my inbox is particularly apropos.

“Have you gotten your “Certificate of Appreciation” lately? Y’know, the one that has become an interchangeable staple of nonprofit mail. It’s just so warm and credible. The kind of thing your kid might get for ‘playing well with others’ in the third grade.

“Or there’s that very special ‘pen package’ – enticing you with a cheap ball point pen that you can use to sign a petition to Congress. Whoops, we forgot that maybe they’re out of session.

“Hey, what about that smart decision to determine the subject matter of the mail program for the coming year? Forget about that pesky national calamity that might get in the way of next September’s “Matching Gift Upgrade Appeal” – the one with a touching story and photo with absolutely no connection to what is happening in the world (or what the organization has currently accomplished).

“Let’s just press the ‘dumbing down’ App and hit our donors with techniques that were outdated twenty years ago. Maybe the Post Office should give me a Certificate of Appreciation when I buy stamps. That will prove they really need help.”

“Folks we are writing to thinking grown-ups in an increasingly complex world. Shouldn’t we try talking to them that way?”

Since retention is the only path to stability and growth, it follows that organizations need to pay serious and meaningful attention, not to techniques and gimmicks, but to true differentiation that comes from the creative and powerful message and stories that truly make an organization stand apart.

Sadly, that’s not happening and it’s not happening with increasing frequency. To put it in commercial terms — our sector, as a whole, is to the commercial sector what generic store brand laundry detergent is to Tide.

Instead of clear and unique messages and poignant stories about our individual organizations, we too often substitute tote bags, labels, calendars, T-Shirts and, yes, certificates of appreciation, believing that because the short-term response rates are better, we’re safer and more stable.

Donors see this phony array multiple times a week or month. And we wonder why acquisition and retention rates are down.

Roger

[Bob Levy has been a consultant and copywriter for social cause and charitable organizations for almost thirty years. You can reach him at rjlevyink@aol.com]

8 Responses to “Copywriters As Migrant Workers”

THANK YOU!!! I’m very jealous of your copywriting in ‘…a day when most fundraisers could read, but hardly any made the foolish claim they could write.’ Ours must be the only sector where the phrase ‘I’m not a writer but…’ is taken seriously. Would we be ok with ‘I’m not a surgeon but..’?!

Nowadays everyone thinks they’re a writer – what’s worse is that most copy is subjected to different teams looking at different parts; no one’s looking at the piece as a whole. ‘Too many cooks spoil the broth’ but at least they’re cooks! What would it taste like when the amateurs get involved? The same way far too many appeals sound; awful.

Bravo!! Beautiful, authentic, intelligent creative is the cornerstone of donor retention as well as acquisition. My donor base and retention rates have grown steadily based on beautifully crafted authentic copywriting.

I made the mistake of recommending my genius copywriter (Lisa Sargent) to an organization run by rank amateurs. Guess who they had making final editing decisions… their head of finance. It beggars belief.

My biggest battles have been defending my creative and it has been worth every bloody battle.

But the disrespect shown by consultants and agencies for professional copywriting is shocking. Consultants with big clients will routinely ask seasoned, proven copywriters to discount their services. It’s ridiculous, copy is a fraction of the overall cost of the campaign and good copy will make or break you. But it’s one thing everyone tries to get on the cheap.

There’s a reason our results are much higher than yours in the same market – superbly crafted, emotional, authentic copywriting. A little respect please.

As a “migrant worker”…so well put! I would have responded to this earlier this a.m. but I was responding to a request to “please put back the emotion and energy that we all removed during editing because we guess we need it back”. This is for a big agency and an important organization.

The “team” idea is out of control when receptionists and finance are given full permission to alter copy.

In my past I’ve been a creative director, agency owner and now a freelance copywriter and the lack of knowledge of the basics of marketing, never mind fundraising, is rampant.

For 30 years I’ve been copywriting and I’ve never seen such a level of disrespect and lack of manners and common sense.

But working at 3 a.m. has its perks: it’s dark enough to see the moon and the stars and think about the world we’re helping and the kids who are waking up on the other side to hopefully, a better life.

Bob, Roger, Charlie: you guys just made my entire holiday fundraising season. If “the best thing we can do to boost response or retention” is to add a sixth reminder to the renewal series…or “save” money by sending out some boilerplate, laser-signatured major donor appeal and faux certificate…or add a cover letter with a harder Ask to the quarterly newsletter…or (gawwwwwwwd no!) let some formulaic dinosaur pulling 2% response rates eclipse an ACTUAL story, engaging photo and compelling reason to ask…and then refuse to acknowledge that — maybe, just maybe — regularly doing a combination of ALL of the above while subjecting your copywriters to an editing gauntlet that includes everyone from the head of finance to your intern aka The English Lit Major (who better to get into the head space of an 85-year-old widow?), and then repeating this year after mind-numbing year, I ask: when will your organization be willing to concede that one or more of these things might just be hurting your retention rates?

Idea: let’s treat donors like they might stick around for more than 1.9 years.

(And note: Twist of irony, one of my clients was posting at the same time as I: see Denisa’s post before mine. By way of full disclosure, we have a long and happy copywriter/NPO relationship. She commits none of the crimes mentioned previously, and bless her for that. Thanks Denisa.)

Well Bob and Roger — you got us copywriters up and going almost as early as migrant workers today. My staff knows that they rarely hear from me before 9 am!
But this topic is way overdue. Ranting is indeed in order. Just this morning we’ve had edits from a client that says “we don’t need to tell them what we’re going to do with their money” and earlier this month “this letter does not tell the donor anything about what we do.” Ahh . . . the copywriting world turns.

But I also have to say that I’m feeling really inspired by some of the partnerships we have with fundraising agencies and nonprofits that truly GET IT that fundraising strategy and copy are inextricably linked–and treat us as true PARTNERS in the process. While there are still those out there that think that “plugging in the copy” is no more important than deciding on the envelope size, that’s not always the case.

We have a nonprofit partner that is in the midst of a 2-year long test to determine if truly authentic, meaningful copy to their mid-level donors, rather than statements and labels, will result in more major donor relationships. We have an environmental client that takes the time to connect us with the campaigners in the field so we can tell firsthand stories about how they are saving the earth– and those campaigners actually treat us as important part of the mission.

Another thing that makes me hopeful is that I’ve started offering trainings to our client organizations on “creating a storytelling culture”. It helps everyone in the organization understand why the flow of information from the program staff to the fundraising staff is SO important. Many times, I think organizations rely on certificates and other gimmicks because they simply are not getting the information they need to tell a good story.

While its true that there are some days I wonder if I can sit through one more call with someone with little fundraising experience telling me that the letter is “too long” . . . most days I love what I do. Thanks for all you do at the Agitator to acknowledge the important role of copywriters and help keep all us migrant workers sane!

Back in Roger’s “golden days,” I was a fledgling designer who was often disheartened to hear my boss Richard Viguerie tell me, repeatedly, that this was a copy-driven medium. After years designing for some of the best copywriters in the business, and learning at their elbow, I realized the truth of this statement. Stories and emotion drive motivation to give.

And so, with some help, I learned the copywriting craft myself. (Yes, occasionally, designers can actually articulate a phrase or two.)

Alas, now that I have a decade or two of copywriting experience behind me, I serve clients who tell me, again repeatedly, that nobody reads anymore and that ours is an above-the-fold, 5-second maximum, offer-driven visual medium. It appears that channel, technique, and attention considerations trump stories and emotional drivers. Yet, as Roger aptly points out, retention and donor loyalty continue to plummet.

I admit I am fuzzy about whether this qualifies as “irony” or “coincidence.”

So true. And quite sad that good freelance writing has become increasingly devalued, with ridiculously tight budgets and deadlines. At the same time, Google, with its new Hummingbird, may improve the chances of good writing being found (and thus supported by the Production-Focused).